


Because I Trust You

by ReederJoe



Series: Transboy!Dan AU [2]
Category: Phandom, dan and phil
Genre: 2015!phan, Dan has anxiety, Fluff, M/M, Phan - Freeform, So does Phil, Transboy!Dan, actual angel Phil, emotional talk, have some feels, look how good I am at titles, they both think the other is way out of their league
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-12
Updated: 2017-01-12
Packaged: 2018-09-17 01:40:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,887
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9298502
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ReederJoe/pseuds/ReederJoe
Summary: The morning after their first time together, Dan and Phil have quite a few things to say to each other. They're just two boys in love.





	

**Author's Note:**

> I feel like I might start doing more with this trans Dan AU I've got happening.

 It was too damn bright. Even with my eyes still closed, I knew that much. It must have been close to noon. I shifted slightly, wanting to go back to sleep, and I felt a pair of arms tighten around me. A hand brushed across my cheek and rest on my neck, just below my ear. My senses suddenly returned and I became aware of a warm presence next to me. My own arms were wrapped around him, fingers gripping his back. I wondered if I’d been doing that all night. He’d have a bruise for sure. My eyes flew open at that thought, and I remembered what I’d done.

                “Hey,” he said softly, stroking his thumb over my cheek. We were facing each other, not even inches apart. If I’d puckered my lips, we would have kissed. I tensed up, waited for the onslaught of memories that usually came after any intimate encounter, but nothing happened. I braced myself for the panic, and while I could feel it there, right below the surface, there was something incredibly calming about the way his hand felt on my face. He tilted his head forward just a bit, pressing his forehead to mine, and I had the feeling he had no intention of letting us get any further apart than this.

                “It’s late,” I replied.

                “It’s okay,” he chuckled, lips curling up into a smile. He watched me for a minute, and then his eyes clouded over with that same thing he’d had last night, right after he’d told me he loved me. I frowned, brow furrowing, and I pulled an arm free to reach for his face. My fingers touched the skin just under his eyebrow. His eyes closed at the contact, and I heard a soft sigh escape his lips.

                “What’s wrong?” I asked, stroking my fingers across his skin. After a moment, his eyes opened again, and he seemed to be confused.

                “What?”

                “Your eyes,” I told him. “Something about them. It’s the same thing I saw last night, right before you said…what you said.” I’d always been able to tell when something was wrong with him. Or anyone else, for that matter. I knew now that the glaze in his eyes was from fear, and I had a pretty good idea why he was scared right now. But I’d said it back, and then I’d done the one thing I’d never thought I’d be able to do with anyone. I wondered if I’d be able to work up the nerve and tell him that. It’d make him feel better, for sure.

                “Was it too soon?” He whispered, features twisting into an expression of pain. His hands reached for me as he said this, wrapping around and clutching at my back. I kept my hand on his face, tracing a finger over his cheek. “It’s only been a few months.”

                “What do you think?” I asked, and a memory flashed through my mind. He’d asked me the same thing. “Did you mean it?” I watched his face closely as he deliberated, and finally he smiled slightly.

                “I’ve never said it to anyone before,” he told me. I could feel the tension in his body. I could feel the tension in my own body. We were both ill-equipped to deal with this emotion, and I had the niggling feeling in the back of my head that it might end badly for that exact reason. “Like I said last night, I never thought I would.”

                “What changed?”

                “I met you,” he stated simply, shrugging a shoulder. “It’s stupid, yeah, but after our first date, I laid in bed that night and didn’t sleep a wink. All I could do was think about when I was going to see you again.” All my blood rushed to my cheeks as I listened to him, and I fought the urge to laugh. I always wanted to laugh in the worst possible situation. He turned to look at me with an even stranger expression than before. “I wanted to call you that morning. Well, what I really wanted was to come and see you, but I didn’t want to seem desperate.” I listened in silence, afraid that anything I said would change the subject. I felt a strange need to hear whatever reasons he had for liking me so much.

                “I ended up going to Louise,” he continued, and my ears perked up. I didn’t know they’d known each other at the point in our lives. “I told her how I was feeling, and she ended up making me feel pretty bleak about the whole thing.” Oh, shit. A thought popped into my head. There were only so many things she could have told him. He caught my expression and chuckled once, rubbing a hand over my shoulder. “Basically, she said that you had commitment issues and more anxiety problems than anyone else, ever, and that I shouldn’t get my hopes up for a second date. After I told her I’d kissed you that night, she said I might as well forget about it. There was no way you’d even be able to look at me without panicking.”

                “She wasn’t totally wrong,” I admitted, after it was clear he wouldn’t continue until I responded. “I didn’t sleep that night, either. I laid there and obsessed over every minute, trying to figure out where I’d fucked it up, ‘cause I knew I had.” I took a deep breath and added, “I always did.”

                Neither of us spoke for the next few minutes, just held onto each other.  I still hadn’t figured out what we were trying to accomplish with this conversation, but now that I was talking, I wanted to say more. There was still so much he had no idea about, and I was sick of keeping it to myself.

       “Right after my transition,” I began, stroking my fingers through his hair, “I tried to date this girl.” He jerked backward, away from me, clearly shocked. His eyes showed his interest, though, and I continued on. “I was a real mess during that phase, you know? I wasn’t really interested in anyone like that, and I didn’t really understand the difference between my gender and my sexual orientation, so afterwards I thought I’d automatically start liking girls.”

                “I only went on the one date,” I assured him, though I hoped he knew that I was obviously not like that now. And this had happened before I even met him. “It only took the one time to figure out that I definitely didn’t like girls.” I wondered, briefly, if I should tell him about the few dates I went on with other men before he came into my life. We already had everything else laid out on the table, so why not pile on some more? “Couple months later, after I’d settled into my new situation pretty nicely, I met thig guy in one of the support groups. We went through a few meetings before finally talking to each other, and I ended up being with him for as long as I’ve been with you.” That haze settled over his eyes again, but I went on. He’d forgive me for it later. “Thing is, we’d gotten to the point where he was getting pretty mad at me for not wanting to sleep with him.”

                “Why didn’t you?” It sounded like an accusation, and I tried to ignore the temper that flared up in me because of it. Phil was really fucking scared right now, and I wasn’t really sure why. Unless he thought I was going to leave him or something. Or he was afraid I was going to tell him I didn’t mean to say the words back last night. We’d get to that eventually, though.

                “I had never told him,” I explained, looking at him again. “He’d assumed I was just there for moral support, so I’d let him believe it for fear that he’d reject me otherwise.” I scoffed at the memory, the irony of that situation. It seemed so long ago now. “So one night, we’re sitting on the couch together, getting comfortable, and I decided to tell him. So I turn my head to look at him and I just…tell him. How I used to be a woman. That’s as far as I got before he jumped up and started screaming at me.”

                I felt him tighten his grip on me as I said this. I wondered what was going through his head right now. He said nothing, so I kept going. It was almost exhausting to talk this much, but I wanted to get it all out. I wasn’t sure if I’d be able to later. “He called me a bunch of names I’d never heard before, and then he said he couldn’t be with a, quote, ‘lying he-she man-whore’”. I started laughing at that memory, remembering how I’d calmly explained to the guy that I couldn’t be a whore if I didn’t sleep with anyone, and that was when he’d stormed out of my old apartment and never spoke to me again. “He left after that, and I never saw him again. Not even in the support group, which I’m still confused about. He should have known going in that I was probably transgender.” Of course, that was when the nightmares started. People coming after me for what I was, hurting me, taking the people I loved. After that, I’d decided I wouldn’t ever date again, simply because it was too much effort to keep a secret, and I didn’t feel like I could trust anyone else to accept it. Until I met Phil, of course. I’d told him after a month, and he’d never even hinted at the idea that he couldn’t deal with it.

                After a few minutes, he finally spoke, his voice slightly muffled from having tucked his head into the crook of my shoulder. I hadn’t even noticed that he’d moved. “No offense, but that’s a fucking shitty story.” I laughed again, and he raised his head to meet my eyes. “I’m sorry that happened.”

                “I had a point to all this,” I said, reaching out a hand to cup his cheek. “You asked if you said it too soon, and I can’t answer that, not for you at least. But I can say that I’ve never felt this way before. I’ve never wanted to be around someone so much.” He smiled slightly, but I could tell he was still feeling vulnerable. “I’ve never been able to relax around people, ever. I’ve always just gone through the motions and looked forward to the end of the day, when I could come back to this house and lock myself away from the rest of society.” I felt my heart speeding up at the memories conjured up by all this, and I paused for a moment, breathing heavily. It was weird, though. I could do my breathing exercises all day and night, but they’d never help as much as one look into his eyes. That’s all it took for me to be able to calm down. I gripped his shoulder with one hand and said, “After that douchebag broke up with me, I swore I’d never tell another soul. I went three years letting people think I was just a regular guy.” I swallowed hard, hoping I wouldn’t throw up on him before this was over. “And then I met you.”

                “You were a regular guy to me,” he said softly. “Even after you told me that you used to be a woman, that didn’t change anything. Who you are now is what matters to me.” He paused a moment, looking almost as nervous as me. “You know who I am, and what I am. I’ve never been attracted to women. I’ve never been attracted to feminine men.” I knew this already. It was one of the first things he’d admitted about himself, when we were just becoming friends. “I’ll admit, I was surprised when you told me. But only because I couldn’t quite comprehend how such a masculine man used to be like the girl in that picture.” The picture he’d caught me with that day, in one of the empty rooms at work. The only picture I had left of who I used to be. At the time, I’d told him it was my sister. Things had sure changed in the past seven months.

                “I told you because I trusted you,” I said finally, hoping to get rid of the doubt he felt. “I trusted you because I loved you.” His mouth popped open, eyes wide. He had obviously not expected that. “I didn’t understand it, but it was there. You made me feel calm when no-one else could, and when you’d come over, when it was time for you to leave, I found myself missing you.” I took a deep breath and opened my mouth again. “I don’t believe in love at first sight, like you said, but…I feel like I’ve known you my entire life.”

                “You keep the panic at bay, and I love you for it. I don’t think you understand fully, how bad it gets sometimes.”

                He was kissing me then, crushing his lips to mine, holing my head in his hands. His fingers twisted through my hair, and I wrapped my arms around his neck, fingers brushing across his shoulders. He leaned into me, pushing us both back against the pillows, and he lifted a leg to straddle me. My lips parted slightly, and his tongue slipped through, caressing my own. It was like last night, when all I’d wanted was to get closer. I heard a grumble from somewhere, and I blushed when I realized it was me, moaning softly.

                We finally broke away, panting, and he pressed his cheek to mine. I’d never known another person to be so intense or vulnerable, but here he was, and he was laying everything out for me to see.

                “I’m not going anywhere,” I whispered to him, sliding a hand around his neck. I pulled him down to my lips and pressed them to his ear, saying, “You’re stuck with me.” I didn’t have to see his mouth to know he was smiling, or his eyes to know they were sparkling again with the certainty I felt. He laid his head on my chest and breathed deeply, hands wandering down my sides. They came to rest by his face, and he tilted his chin to look up at me. Our eyes met, and the adoration in them was enough to make me tear up. I’d never cried from happiness, never in my life. I’d cried plenty of times in sadness or despair, or from being so stressed out I could kill someone. But the tears that were now threatening to spill were not from anything I’d ever experienced before. I’d had my arms around him, holding him close, but now I pulled a hand free and brought it up to wipe at my eyes. He reached his own hand out, fingers stretched toward me, to touch my wrist.

                “I can live with that,” he said, smiling. And then he was moving up toward my head, taking my face in his hands again. His fingers weaved through my hair, holding me still. After a moment of shuffling, he rolled us over so that I was on top, and I placed my hands on either side of his face to brace myself as I pressed my lips to his firmly. His hands were still lost, stroking softly, and I released his mouth after a few seconds. His expression was suddenly nervous, and his brow furrowed again. I knew exactly why, and I heard the words in my mind right before he said them out loud. “I love you, Dan,” he murmured, watching my face. Maybe he was waiting for me to give him a sign that his feelings weren’t returned. I knew what it felt like to be in that position, and possibly for the first time in my life, I was glad that I could smile and say those words back.

                “I love you, too,” I whispered with as much sincerity as I could muster. His smile told me everything I needed to know, and our lips came together softly once more. The kiss was brief, but so much was passed through it. For the first time in my life- either of them- I wasn’t anxious about the future. I wasn’t dreading the day or worrying about what might happen. After my transition, I thought I’d never go through another change. At least, not one so big as this. And yet, here I was, lying in bed with another man, content to never leave. His arms came back around me, hands sliding around my waist, and his head fell back to my chest, tucked underneath my chin. I wound my arms around him and pulled him as close as possible. I’d never felt so safe, and I never wanted to give up that feeling. I felt his lips touch my skin for just a moment, and I knew we were both in the same boat. Neither of us could leave now without tipping the other over.


End file.
